Ruthless: A New Short Film

[rjk2000]

(Edit: Teaser trailer now posted down below in the thread. Thanks!)

Hi. Haven't posted an actual short, narrative film in a while (I've only been working on commercials and other people's films since then). We did this quickie 2 1/2 day short, as a homage to old school action films and crime graphic novels, and I'm kinda proud of what we were able to accomplish in such a short time period. (We used two GH13, but only posting camera info for those interested.) Since then, I've been using the footage to teach myself Apple Color (wow, much easier than I anticipated), and a few new tricks in Apple Motion.

The final film is still in the editing phases (we still need to do create more music, do some sky replacements, etc.), but I hope to have the teaser trailer posted in the next few days. (I've finished editing it -- just want to show it to the cast and crew first, before it goes online.)

But first here are some of the character promo images.

 

[rjk2000]

And here are some screenshots from the teaser/test trailer. Please let me know if you see anything wonky, weird, or downright ugly in them offhand. I'd like to correct anything in the final film. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

 

[MalcolmOng]

Great looking stills there! I'm a real sucker for a colorful color palette in grading, so these really appealed to me especially haha. Not sure if I can offer you anything on whether it looks wonky or not unless I see it in motion, but some of them do look a bit soft, though I'm gonna write that off to compression of the grabs.

And a question for you - the shot of the girl in the corridor (second row, first from left) - is that a physical lens flare, or an effect from the grading? These lens-flare esque things seem to pop into some of your shots, like the first one of him holding a katana (sweet prop, btw)

 

[rjk2000]

some of them do look a bit soft, though I'm gonna write that off to compression of the grabs.

Ha! You've got a good eye. Some of the shots are indeed softer. A few are because I shot with such a wide aperture (f1.4) with a lot of backlight, but most of it was an experiment in color grading. I was torn between trying to get a soft vintage, faded look that I learned from this color grading thread at Vimeo (http://vimeo.com/groups/colorgrading/forumthread:240468). I thought it might add to the b-movie feel. But at the same time, I kinda like the natural sharpness and contrast of the camera, but was afraid it would be too videoy. I too love a good, strong color palette.I'm kinda torn, but I would love anyone's opinion once I post the teaser.

And a question for you - the shot of the girl in the corridor (second row, first from left) - is that a physical lens flare, or an effect from the grading? These lens-flare esque things seem to pop into some of your shots, like the first one of him holding a katana

As for the girl in the corridor, it's actually a combination. There's natural lens flares coming from the right (that crossed over to the left some), but I also overlayed a film burn compsite effect on it as an experiment for transitions. I spread them out over the trailer to see how they would look.

 

[MalcolmOng]

Ah ok got it. Can't wait to see the trailer then!

 

[rjk2000]

As promised: here's the teaser for Ruthless. Ruthless is a short film homage to crime graphic novels and late 70's and early 80's revenge movies. This teaser trailer is composed of various color grading tests and simple vfx -- as a way to test out concepts while we're hard at work on finishing up the final film (due early 2012).

Because some of the images in the teaser are tests, we would love any comments on what or what didn't work. Not sure what we could change, but any advice would be greatly appreciated. If anyone's got any constructive criticism, good or bad, please share. Anything I incorporate into the final film (which we're editing and in post now), I will.

 

[Chris Adler]

Personally the grade distracts me, but I'm an organic looking image kinda guy, not a stylized look lover.